Digital Wallonia @ the Smart City Expo World Congress 2017 in Barcelona

The 7th Smart City Expo World Congress (SCEWC) took place from 14 to 16 November 2017 in Barcelona. Digital Wallonia was there, at the combined stand organised by AWEX in collaboration with Flanders Investment and Trade and Brussels Invest & Export. A programme was put together for the Walloon cities and start-ups that were there.

Over the next few decades, the urban sprawl will continue to eat away at the land, and the world’s population is set to increase by 2.5 billion people in towns and cities between now and 2050. The world is becoming more interdependent, and cities have a duty to act together to tackle similar challenges in terms of sustainability and managing different factors affecting citizens, such as: population growth and ageing, climate change, traffic congestion and pollution, a lack of affordable housing, the energy transition, education, health, citizenship, the collaborative economy etc.

Over the course of 3 days, the Smart City Expo World Congress put Barcelona right at the heart of things in terms of expertise and solutions to respond to these urgent questions. These fundamental changes demand new ways of thinking about urban living, making it more open, smart, sustainable and inclusive**.**

Representatives from cities, institutions, research centres, universities, opinion leaders, experts and the main decision-makers from big businesses meet to put forward their projects for the future.

In just a few years, the SCEWC has established itself as the leading benchmark event in the field of “smart cities”.

In 2016, the sixth event of its kind broke new records in terms of visitor numbers. SCEWC in a few figures:

• 591 exhibitors (+30% compared to 2015);
• More than 600 towns and cities taking part and 16,700 visitors;
• 420 experts took part in the seminars;
• International keynote speakers: Ellen MacArthur, Susan Etlinger, Parag Khanna, David Bollier, Kent Larson and encore David Harvey.

This year, the event attracted 675 exhibitors, so a rise of 20% compared to las year, 18,754 visitors and more than 700 towns and cities from 120 countries.

Develop an international network and take inspiration from local best practices by taking part in the Walloon delegation.

A programme coordinated by AWEX and the AdN was followed by members of this delegation, with the help of the on-site ambassador from Digital Wallonia.

Some of the highlights of the event include:

• A meeting with RECI, a Spanish network of smart cities that currently encompasses 62 towns.
• A presentation of Barcelona’s Smart City projects, including some involving embedded sensors and the city’s management platform: SENTILO & CITY OS.
• Presentation of 22@, Barcelona’s Innovation District(by David Martinez, the coordinator of the 22@ Committee).
• International networking opportunities at an organised evening event.

The Walloon businesses exhibited at this international event under the umbrella of Digital Wallonia. Also present were WR Citizens, the winners of the most recent Citizens of Wallonia hackathon, which meant they could be there with their prototype for a virtual/augmented reality solution.

They were on the combined Digital Wallonia and AWEX stand at the event, which also welcomed representatives from our Walloon towns and cities and our Smart Region delegates.

This gave us the opportunity to showcase the DigitalWallonia #smartregion brand, the innovative Smart Region drive put together in Wallonia focusing on towns and cities, representatives and members of the Walloon ecosystem involved in “smart” solutions.

The Smart Region Charter, recently launched for the development of multi-service mobile apps, open to the citizens of Wallonia, went down well with other regions and countries represented at this unmissable international event dedicated to Smart Cities. The first signatory to the Charter presented its solution, Wallonie en Poche (Wallonia in your pocket).

Particular attention was paid to the practical Smart City guide, aimed at towns and municipalities and published by one of our Smart Region representatives, the [profiles type="single" slug="smart-city-institute" display="link"]Smart City Institute[/profiles].

The event also focused on putting human beings at the heart of the smart city, and on the importance of open data when it comes to developing smart services. A tour of the show also provided an opportunity to find out about data platforms that help manage all the services of a smart city, or even a smart region, in the same place. This was the year of the “dashboard”, whereby you can manage smart services using open data and information collected in real time, with sensors for example.

While these platforms have existed for some time, they have traditionally focused on security and video surveillance. Now, they help you monitor and manage smart services thanks to the use of all sorts of different sources of data, and they can even automate certain decisions.

The platforms showcased at the event include:

• the Huawei control centre used in the Chinese city of Shenzen, including in particular to manage mobility services.
• the Catalan platform, Sentilo.
• the Dijon Métropole project, via a control centre estimated to cost 105 million over 12 years, entrusted to a consortium made up of Bouygues, Citelum (EDF), Suez and Capgemini.
• Dubai’s platform, which also won the 2017 smart city award, thanks to its plans to adopt blockchain technology in certain government departments, and its support for the creation of a blockchain industry that will give start-ups and businesses a boost.

The results of a satisfaction questionnaire distributed among businesses by AWEX were very positive: the scores ranged from 80 to 95%. A verbal debriefing with the towns and cities was also organised by the AdN at a monthly meeting of the Smart Cities Core Team.

Among the positive aspects brought to light by participants:

• Visibility,
• Coherence,
• The quality of the organisation, preparation, support, coordination between Digital Wallonia (AdN) and AWEX, and the execution of the event itself,
• The number and quality of professional contacts (mainly technology partnerships and distributors) and the market approach,
• The visual quality and layout of the friendly combined Belgian stand,
• The extent to which participants complemented each other (cities, start-ups, public bodies, business incubators etc.),
• The willingness of AWEX and AdN representatives to help at the event,
• The quality of the individuals met and tours organised.

100% of businesses asked and cities represented would like to come back next year.

In conclusion, the general consensus can be summed up as follows: growing well and very promising. As far as the professional contacts made were concerned, 40% were very good and 60% were good.